The Waters of Eternal Youth by Donna Leon Page A

law”?’
    â€˜Oh,
Papà
, don’t go all official on me. You know exactly what I mean: a law that’s a law but nobody pays any attention to.’ Chiara shook her head at Paola’s attempt to serve her more pasta.
    How children spoke truths, Brunetti reflected, that parents were meant to deny. He and his colleagues had long since adjusted to the fact that some laws were decorative rather than enforced. People arrested for theft or violence: take them down to the Questura and charge them, tell the foreigners among them to leave the country within a certain number of days, and then let them go. Arrest them a week later for the same crime, and start the ­merry-­go-­round all over again, the same horses bobbing up and down with each turn.
    He saw the moment when Paola gave in to her impulse to cause trouble when she could. ‘Like the law about . . .’
    â€˜As I was saying to Chiara,’ he interrupted her to say, ‘it’s somewhere between legality and illegality. If you stop someone on the street to ask them for money it’s not a crime, though it’s an offence. But if you send minors to beg for money, then it’s a crime.’
    Brunetti had said this with the voice he used for professional explanations, hoping it would suffice.
    But Chiara was still preoccupied. ‘What happens to you if you ask for money?’
    â€˜It’s a
contravvenzione
,’ he answered, trying to make the word sound important. Not a crime, but a violation, he told himself. Will she understand the distinction? Did he?
    â€˜Does that mean nothing happens if you do it?’ Chiara asked.
    He took time to finish his pasta and looked across at Paola. ‘What’s next?’ he asked, hoping Chiara would be distracted by the thought of more food.
    â€˜Does it,
Papà
?’ she asked again.
    â€˜Well,’ he said in his most Solomonic tones, ‘the person who does it gets an administrative sanction.’
    â€˜That’s just a term,’ Chiara said quickly. ‘It doesn’t mean anything.’
    â€˜It opens a record with the police about you,’ Brunetti said.
    â€˜But nothing happens to you,’ she insisted.
    Through all of this, Raffi’s head had turned back and forth between his sister and his father as though he were watching a shuttlecock. Paola pushed her chair back, collected the plates, and carried them to the sink at the end of the room. Brunetti took a sip of wine and finally asked, ‘Why are you curious about this, Chiara?’
    â€˜Maybe she’s looking for a way to pick up some pocket money in the afternoons after school,’ Raffi suggested, ‘and she wants to know if she’ll be arrested.’ His sister snatched up her napkin and flicked it in his direction. Paola turned at the sound, but by the time she saw them, the napkin was already back in Chiara’s lap and she was taking a sip of water.
    Chiara looked at her father and then at her mother, and then down at her plate. Brunetti waited, and Paola, at the counter, returned to spooning vegetables into two ceramic bowls.
    â€˜There’s one of those new Africans,’ Chiara began at last, then paused for a long time before continuing. ‘He stops us all and asks for money. Every day: he’s always there when we get out of classes.’
    â€˜What do you mean by “new” Africans?’ Paola raised her voice to ask.
    â€˜Not like the
vu cumprà
,’ Raffi interrupted to explain. Brunetti expected Chiara to object, but she simply nodded in agreement. Over the years, Brunetti, like most Venetians, had grown accustomed to the presence of the Senegalese immigrants, called
vu cumprà
by everyone in the city, even though political correctness demanded that they be called
venditori ambulanti.
Brunetti had tried to use the polite term but kept forgetting it and so ended up calling them, as did everyone else, by their original